Q.Describe Young's double-slit experiment for the interference of light. Obtain the expression for fringe width. (4+3=7)
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Start your 14-day free trial to unlock the full solution →Young's double-slit experiment shows interference between light from two coherent, closely-spaced slits, producing alternating bright and dark fringes with a fringe width β = λD/d.
Description of the experiment: A monochromatic light source illuminates a single narrow slit S, which acts as a source of coherent light. The light from S then falls on two closely spaced narrow slits, and (separated by a small distance ), which act as two coherent secondary sources (same frequency, constant phase difference, since both derive from the same original wavefront). The light from and overlaps on a screen placed at a distance () from the slits, producing a pattern of equally spaced alternating bright and dark fringes — bright fringes where the waves interfere constructively, and dark fringes where they interfere destructively.
Derivation of fringe width:
Consider a point P on the screen at a distance from the central point O (the point equidistant from and ). The path difference between the two waves arriving at P is:
(using the small-angle/geometric approximation valid when ).
Condition for bright fringes (constructive interference): path difference is an integral multiple of wavelength:
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